Come on over and play!



lemonpunch is hosting an iconfest that runs through 26th May. This is your chance to request an icon or several. You can be very specific (linking to caps, requesting specific verbiage) or you can be more general.

If you're very lucky, lemonpunch might fulfill your request. If you're unfamiliar with her work, you're in for a treat. She creates small masterpieces; what she does with color, lighting, & textures is magical. Also? She is the only other iconist I know who has made a boatload of Calvin & Hobbes icons so she HAS to be amazing.

If you're hoping that I will try my hand at your request, please link me to your request so I'm certain to see it. I'm trying to keep up but the post is already a little unwieldy; I can only imagine what'll look like in a week and a half.

Iconfest links: [rules/about] [promotions] [f.a.q.s] [the PROMPT page]

ETA: And, of course, MAKERS are invited, too! This is your chance to read through the prompts, find something familiar to tackle or try something completely outside of your comfort zone that you've never tried before.

The Better Half has a band, the Flying Fish Sailors, and they recently won the Houston Press 2007 Award for "Best Pirate Band." I don't know how much competition there is for the award, and I kind of suspect that someone made up the category in order to give the guys an award but hey, who's complaining? An accolade is an accolade. They've collected many honors in their two decades as a band but another one is always welcome.

On a related note, band member mrkamikaze has vintage, out of print, live recordings of blast from the past events: 1995's Blarney Fest and 1996's Son of Blarney Fest -- they're available for FREE download. Thank you, mcroft, for making these rare recordings available! As always, the in-print Flying Fish Sailors catalog is available from Amazon. :)

hwrnmnbsol has just posted one of my all-time favorite Tales from the Job Site, CHONNNGGG. I first read the story almost a decade ago and I still love it.

In high school, he went to a rival school and was my academic nemesis. I lost out to him all too often. It wasn't just in math or science -- one talent geniuses weren't uncommon and I could have taken comfort in being better than he in SOMETHING -- but math, science, literature, writing, history, and on and on...he was always winning the places I wanted. I'm sure he had no idea that I would mentally groan when he'd walk in the test room.

He didn't necessarily endear himself by turning up in my college freshman orientation group (ARGH!) and immediately dating the woman in the group with whom I'd bonded. He was sort of omnipresent. I doubt he was aware of how he'd thwarted me for years when we each still teenagers. Fortunately, I've mellowed over the years and now I can appreciate that, if I had to lose out to someone over and over and over and over and over (ok, I may still hold it against him a tiny bit), it was to someone who is brilliant.

And now, I want to go and get up to some stack mischief -- but you'll have to read the piece to get that. ;)

Last month was painful and long. I had family here for most of the month and when my parents left to drive home, they got about 65 miles away before their car threw a rod. My dog died. My mother had surgery and had an "adverse reaction" to the painkillers. I've been so stressed I've forgotten to refill my thyroid medication and haven't taken it for an entire month. A new austerity program at work featuring no bonuses and no raises is rumored to be the plan of our company's new owner. I missed getting a card to msjudi for a cool project that she mailed today. Even though I had the card in my possession since the Pride parade in early June.

Is it fall yet?

~~**~~

On the up side, lots of news these days about SG-1 alumni projects:

- Teryl Rothery is in the new Bab 5 movie and it's now available. riverfox has a post with links to a bunch of yummy screen caps that she made. Teryl is looking great!

- Amanda Tapping, Ben Browder, and Christopher Judge attended Comic Con and mata090680 has lots of big pics as part of a larger Comic Con picspam. CJ appears to have been growing out his hair and well, I wouldn't have recognized him at a casual glance with the new facial hair. Some of the pics are big enough that I can count Amanda Tapping's eyelashes. And the number of freckles on her breasts.

- Apparently, both Michael Shanks and Lexa Doig have done some guest spots on Eureka. ETA: So has Teryl! Woo hoo! See Terylicious for details and stay tuned to The Teryl Appearances Yahoo Group for updates.

http://www.baldheretic.com/pics/photography/vanishingpoint.jpg

I LOVE this photo! It was taken by mrkamikaze and it's the best capture of the MFAH's light tunnel that I've seen.

I worked at the museum back when they were expanding and I recall the angst that went into deciding what to put in the tunnel between the new and old buildings. At first, it was to be a simple hall and they were going to install cases to hold some of the museum's admittedly scanty collection of Native American arts. Then that got bogged down in the politics of marginalizing non-Western art to "pass by" status and the wank was long and bitter.

I'll admit, I rolled my eyes when they announced that the tunnel would, itself, become a work of light art. How wrong I was. The light shifts color and it's very, very cool experiential art. A bit disorienting to walk through but it's brilliant.

(a moment aside from the usual fandom squee for a charity pimp)

This is the week of Classy Chassis, the better half's classic car show here in Houston on June 10 in Reliant Stadium. All profits benefit United Cerebral Palsy, so it's an excellent, excellent cause.

Joe works all year, literally, in organizing this. He's on the car selection committee, which seems to entail long weekend meetings in coffee shops with other car guys to talk cars and attending car shows around the country. We're also on the host committee which means a busy time for us this week.

We're very excited about the show this year. A few factoids:

• 120 cars


• Estimated worth of cars on the floor this year = $80 - $120 million


• Cars are coming from Texas, California, Washington, St. Louis, Chicago, and Guadalajara


• Museums participating include the Petersen Automotive Museum in Los Angeles, CA and the Nethercutt Collection & Museum in Sylmar, CA.


• For those who are into Texas racers, the Chapparal 2, legendary racing car from the mid 1960s, will be on display. This is the car that brought Texan Jim Hall to fame in the racing world.


• Have I mentioned the raffle? Grand prize is a 2007 Mercedes Benz SLK280.


• All profits go directly to United Cerebral Palsy.

I'll be photographing the cars again this year. I'm not a car enthusiast but I can appreciate the artistry involved in the gorgeous body designs. We've also invited mrkamikaze, a far more accomplished photographer with even spiffier camera equipment, to attend and photograph. (So, are you coming? Will public peer pressure work?)

Anyone here in Houston who wishes to attend should definitely let me know. We have free tickets every year that go unused. It's at Reliant Center, meaning that even though it's Houston and it's June, it'll be inside in the air conditioning and bug-free stadium.

First, the pimpage:

- sgdiverse_award -- A place to celebrate non-McShep fic for SGA. I didn't know about it until this morning when jalabert told me she'd received a notice listing off a bunch of her stories as having been nommed. Yay! Nominations are open until April 15.

- oneill_icontest -- A GEN challenge community that actually focuses on Jack. Just Jack. 100% Jack love. It manages to bring together Jack fans, Jack/Sam fans, Jack/Daniel fans, and all other Jack/whoever fans over our greatest common denominator: Jack! He's so much fun to play with and there are scads of very talented icon makers there already. Go. Icon. Vote. Enjoy!

Now, the general happiness part:

A day off work is my definition of a Good Friday so it was already good but today brought sunny skies and welcome, much cooler weather. The bluebonnets are blooming, my dogs are happy, Joe is home, we're thinking about catching the Imperial Rome show at the science museum...it's a beautiful day.

I'm grappling with how to post a whole pile of icons that don't fall neatly into tv show categories. I have enough icons to make several big posts at this point so I need to post soon if I'm going to at all. These are the sort of problems I like.

Yay for Vancouver and its hard-working but tiny cast of actors! Teryl Rothery will be guest-starring on Supernatural. I'll be the one on the sofa, watching through my fingers.

To celebrate, Terylicious is hosting a writing contest to honor the all too common fate of Teryl's characters: they die. Submit 250-500 words about How Teryl's Character Will Die. There will be prizes, of course. :) For all the official info, hie thee hence to:

The Official Stuff for the Terylicious Supernatural Contest

Today was a day of goodies! paddies posted icons *points to brand new, sparkly icon* full to the brim with pretty, pretty Brian and Justin, doing many wonderful and naughty things, and their Love That Shall Never Die -- AND oxoniensis posted some new textures for making icons.

Really? That makes life good right there. :)

~~**~~

But wait! There's more! It gets better! It was Heroes night! I posted this originally as a response to katie_m's post but figured what the hell? I should post vague and random thoughts in my own LJ, too. Hey - I have my own f-list to harass with this stuff. ;-)

( Need I mention that the whole point of this cut is to hide the spoilers??? )

Damn - there's so much going on that I missed posting this.

DEADLINE: NOVEMBER 2, 2006 (eep!)
WHAT: Fan fic, Videos, and Art (original, wallpapers, banners, icons)
WHERE: Entries :: Voting

Please, please, please go and support this. Teryl Rothery is one of the nicest people and Janet Fraiser IS the doctor for SG-1. There is no substitute.

Disclaimer: I entered icons in the contest but I totally am not asking for your vote. In fact, there are lots of superclever icons entered and choosing is going to be next to impossible for me. *sigh*

Finally! I found the LJ archaeologists! :)

Before this gets lost in my squee: shovelbums is all about making connections for archaeology work. moonshayde? ciaracat? Bueller? ;-) I think there are a couple of people on my f-list to whom this might appeal. Actually, it appeals to ME but I've dropped out of the life of shovelbum and become a far more boring person.

For those who would rather wear their archaeological pride, I found arch_icons. I will shortly be dithering over which icons to replace. Damn it, LJ, would it be so awful to sell me another 100 icon spots? I'd pay for the pleasure.

ETA: Heh - and if the first picture here on this post doesn't disabuse folks of the notion that archaeology is a glamorous and exciting profession, I don't know what will! Actually, archaeolgy is an exciting profession but there's a lot of muck involved and comfort isn't a priority.

terylicious is hosting the Third Annual Terylicious Contest and is soliciting submissions of art (icons, wallpapers, banners, original works of art, etc.), fanfic, and music videos. Due date for entries is 9 October 2006.

Entries are not limited to SG-1's Doctor Fraiser. Teryl has been in dozens? hundreds? of movies so there's an absolute metric ton of source material to play with. Terylicious also has an extensive collection of gorgeous photos and screen caps.

I'm probably the last Stargate fan on my f-list to know about this but I'm pimping it anyway. Just in case there's anyone out there who, like me, didn't know about it before now. There just can't be enough Teryl love in this world.

My Better Half's Band, the Flying Fish Sailors, were nominated again for a Houston Press Award. This year, it is in the Best World Music Category. Yay!

Their second album, Remanant Stew, is out of print and thus available as a free download. It doesn't really sound a whole lot like the modern version of the band as this album hails from back in the days when they were but a trio but hey, it's still cool British Isles folk, a few American tunes, a couple of sea shanties, and some original pieces -- and free!

From the fanthropology community, a survey about how and why people do - or don't - use icons. The surveyer asked that we pimp for her since she's looking for the widest possible audience and I'm obliging. :)

Here's the text:

I'm working on my doctoral dissertation in Library and Information Science. I am specializing in Social Informatics, which explores both technological effects on social behavior and also social shaping of technology. In my dissertation I plan to fanfic writing communities on LJ with an eye to how the technology affects the type of interactions people have and also what uses people put the technology to (some of which were not intended).

To me one of the most interesting uses of technology I’ve seen in LJ fandom is the use of icons. However knowing exactly what people are getting out of icons or intending with their use is something I’d like to know more about. If you’d be willing to tell me, please take the survey. All responses and comments to the post will remain anonymous.

I would like to get a number of people who both DO and DON’T use icons answering the survey. I would appreciate any help in pimping this, so no matter what someone’s own icon use is like their opinions will be very useful. Thanks!

It didn't take me very long to fill out -- and there's much to be said for supporting Librarians of the Future.

My weekend was consumed with the 3rd Annual Classy Chassis as my better half is heavily involved year round in organizing it. This is the first year that I think it really took off and was wildly successful. Lots of money raised for United Cerebral Palsy. Yay!

I had no idea that Joe had taken my photos from last year's show (2005) and turned them over to UCP for use on their web site. I'd have cleaned them up had I known they were doing that. The quality varies and the thumbnails link to randomly-sized originals...but oh well.

( my fave car from 2005 behind the courtesy cut )

Hopefully my pics this year will be better since I standardized my settings and used a tripod.

If you want to see some gorgeous, artsy pics from this year's show, a professional photographer was one of the attendees and he sent us a link to some astounding pics that he took. I know next to nothing about cars but I appreciate them as sculptural forms, as exemplified in my favorite from this year's show, a Delahaye from the 1930s.

No surprise that my two favorites are both convertibles.

Joe's band, The Flying Fish Sailors, will be playing at the Continental Club's Pajama Party tonight. I don't normally pimp their appearances because I assume those who are interested are already on the baldheretic feed...but just in case I'm wrong...

If you get to the show early, go next door and check out the wonderful clothing creations by designer Judy Masliyah at Sig's Lagoon. All I can find on the web is a Houston Chronicle article about Masliyah's work. I really want a skeleton print dress. Really, really. The store had one, but in a bizarre twist of fate, the size they had fit my waist/hips but the bodice was too small. As a woman of mostly normal-sized upper body stuck on top of gigantic hips, I was dumb-founded. Joe scored major brownie points for procuring the Masliyah skirt I loved for V-Day this year. I am **almost** looking forward to our hot weather so I can wear it.

( That 4 things meme floating around LJ. )